Disneyland may be the happiest place on earth for kids, but it can be hell on earth for moms. Like a parade of bad parenting moments on display, I watched parents cut lines, trample toddlers and say inappropriate things to other parents to an extreme that I have never witnessed before.
Fortunately, I just finished reading the Blessing of a Skinned Knee, Wendy Mogel’s thoughtful book about embracing challenging moments as good opportunities for our children to build up their tolerance. Our Disney vacation offered many such teachable moments:
- Patience – when the other parents blatantly cut in line as we waited our turn to meet the characters. “Everyone will get a turn” and Guess what? We all did.
- Problem solving – We staked out a spot for the parade 40 minutes in advance. A few minutes before the parade started another family asked if they could squeeze in next to us. We agreed, only to have the other adults muscle in front of our children and block their view. Modeling kindness and firmness, I pointed out that while we were happy to make room for them, they needed to be considerate and stand back so the children could see.
- Self Soothing – On the Small World boat, another mother rudely told my enthusiastic son to be quiet, then launched into her own loud monologue about all the countries on display in the ride. “See the Flamenco dancers. They do that in Spain and over here are gondolas like they have in Venice, Italy. There’s the Sphinx from Egypt…” I don’t think she took a breath during the entire ride. At one point, my children complained that they couldn’t hear the music. They were right. It was annoying. But they weren’t going to change her. The only thing they could do was find a way to cope for themselves. I told them to just enjoy the sites and if they needed to, sing the song to themselves. They didn’t love it, but they did learn that they can always control their own reactions even when they don’t like how others around them are behaving.
It’s an interesting mind twist to embrace challenging conflicts with other parents as a teaching opportunity. Have you ever done anything similar?
3 Comments
Great post! I would have told the loud mouthed mom that if she felt the need to shush my kid, she should shush herself. Politely as possible, of course!
It’s a Small World is not a European vacation. I don’t understand the parents who need to make everything an educational experience. it’s an amusement park for pete’s sake!
OMG — we were just at Disneyland and had some woman start swearing at me in front of my kids because my two year old tried to hug Tigger while they were taking a photo of their kid. Great example!